Friday 18 December 2015

Adopt A Family "Wrap up"

Our Winter Carnival was a huge success thanks to the hard work of so many students, staff and parents. The day raised over $3500 for our adopt-a-family program. Special thanks for many donations of prizes, food and discounts making it possible to make such a large sum in one day for charity.

Thank you to The Filling Station and the Campbell family for their generous donation and time, Canadian Wholesale Club, Carnival for Kids at Heart, Fatburger, Opa, and the Steed family and the Powell family for helping to secure some great prizes. In addition Robert Richmond from Head to Toe Safety for donating a custom banner that will be used for our Carnival for many years to come. We are so proud of our students and their work for charity this holiday season. A challenge was put forth for student playing at the carnival to put the name Adopt-A-Family instead of their own name, and it was touching to see just how many tags were for Adopt-A-Family. This displays the character and generosity of our kids and as a result, one of the prizes is going to a family.  Thanks to the Fish Creek grade 1 teachers for bringing over their kids to be a special part of our day.

Congratulations to all the winners and the students responsible for coordination of the carnival.

ADOPT A FAMILY has been a huge success for the families in need this holiday season. Due to the generosity or our families and the work of our students in the carnival and bake sale, we had enough money to adopt a fourth family. Special thanks to Superstore in Shawnessey for their generous donation and discount, Save-On-Foods, Superstore and Home Depot for all donating gift cards for our families,  Bath and Body Works, Bluenotes and Bootlegger at Southcentre for making our dollars stretch well beyond our budget! The students are busy wrapping presents as our fitness room has turned into Santa’s Workshop for a few days. A huge thank you to all of our MidSun Families for taking 99% of the tags from our Christmas tree and purchasing gifts for individual family members!  The spirit of giving is definitely in the air J

 

Merry Christmas

Monday 14 December 2015

Last Week before Christmas

Happy Holidays Laker Families,

We have a fun week planned for our last week before Christmas.  Wednesday will be Christmas Sweater day and Friday is Pyjama Day!  The rumours that there was no school on Friday are unfounded…there will be lots of fun holiday time from December 19-January 3rd. First day back in 2016 will be January 4, 2016.

January 4th will be the first day for Chris Giffen, our new principal.  He has already been by to meet the staff and attend our last School Council meeting.  He is very excited to get to know everyone and lead the Lakers in the New Year.

Thank you to all who have contributed to the Adopt a Family program.  The generosity of our school community is outstanding and three families are sure to have the best Christmas ever because of your big hearts.  Our whole fitness room is filled with presents waiting to be delivered this Wednesday.  It is a happy place, what joy it is to give. 

As Friday is my last day I would like to extend my warm wished to everyone for a happy holiday and a bright new year.  I am excited to keep up with the many great things that have been going on at MidSun. Things like our home reading program, Read Theory, Hour of Code, Debate Club, Learning Commons events, Charity Basketball game and the upcoming basketball season.  I will miss the busy and exciting life of MidSun and the opportunity to work with such amazing staff, students and parents. 

All the best,

Veronica Saretsky

Wednesday 9 December 2015

Code Week in the Library Learning Commons


 This week we are taking up the Hour of Code challenge as part of a global initiative to have students around the world participate in an hour of learning computer coding. Classes will be coming down to the Library Learning Commons (LLC) where they will be introduced to coding and the Hour of Code website https://hourofcode.com/ca. The actual learning occurs in the LLC via https://code.org. Students are able to choose between Minecraft, Star Wars and Frozen as themes while they work with increasingly complex coding capabilities. More than just jumping on a trendy bandwagon, we are attempting to prepare students for the jobs of the future, jobs which don’t even exist yet. We sincerely believe in diversifying the skills of our students in hopes of preparing them for the future.


Throughout the year you will see an increase in technology in the LLC including 5 new coding stations equipped with Raspberry Pis. These are tiny computers which use several coding languages and can assist students in building their own games and other activities. Here is a helpful link if you are curious https://www.raspberrypi.org/help/what-is-a-raspberry-pi/. Additionally, we are bringing in Lego in hopes to give your children a chance to explore stop motion animation (we are still looking for donations of extra Lego you may have around the house which isn’t being played with anymore). 

Tuesday 8 December 2015

News from Grade 7

First of all, congratulations to all of our Gr. 7 volleyball players, who finished the season with a tournament at Strathcona Tweedsmuir School; it was a great experience for all.   And, to our wrestling team members who are in the midst of several tournaments and are seeing amazing results, good luck on finishing the season with a bang.

Gr. 7s are immersed in their learning this month!  From discovering “Who’s Who in New France” in social studies to preparing for the famous “Egg Drop” experiment in science, students and teachers are inventing a variety of clever ways to explore the world around them.  Thank-you in advance to our parents for helping their student ensure they have the proper materials for upcoming classroom tasks.  A quick check on teacher D2L pages will also help students come prepared.

Winter carnival was a big success this month; students had a great time participating in events, gobbling up treats and raising funds for charity.  As December continues, please check out the Midsun blog for information on the annual Adopt-A-Family campaign.  Your support of community members is very much appreciated. 
Please remember to remind your child to come to school dressed appropriately for the weather and school.  This is a good time for layers as it tends to be cold outside yet quite warm in some of our classrooms.  Also, just a reminder to send students with their own water bottles to keep with them in class. 

Wishing our families warmth and joy as you prepare for this holiday season! 
Midsun Gr. 7 Team

 

 

 

 

Tuesday 1 December 2015

Parent/Student/Teacher Interviews this week


We are looking forward to this week’s Parent/Student/Teacher interviews which take place on Thursday December 3rd from 5:30-8PM, and Friday December 4th from 9 AM – Noon.  Please make sure to book through our new on line system. Our school will be following a Friday schedule with a short day on Thursday and of course, there will be no school on Friday for students.

We will also be hosting a REVERSE BOTTLE DRIVE again during interviews. All proceeds will go towards program enhancement. Please bring empty cans and bottles to school during interviews and drop them off in the REVERSE BOTTLE DRIVE trailer in our parking lot. This is a great and easy way to support our school.

Thank you for your support.
Sincerely,
Sherri Chatani
Assistant Principal